


Hoodie

by grahamhannah53



Series: Shinobi Blood Is Red, Shinobi Tears Are Blue [1]
Category: Naruto
Genre: Angst, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Everything Hurts, F/M, Fluff and Angst, Grieving, Hoodies, Memories, Songfic, asuma is dead, based on a song by hey violet, kakashi and kurenai are pals, shinobi blood is red
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-12
Updated: 2019-11-12
Packaged: 2021-01-29 11:55:11
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,137
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21409774
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/grahamhannah53/pseuds/grahamhannah53
Summary: Kurenai goes to the memorial stone with a hoodie clutched in her hand. It belonged to Asuma, once, before he'd given it to her. Now he lies cold in his grave, and she's learning to cope.____________________________________________________This work is part of a series I'm writing called Shinobi Blood Is Red, Shinobi Tears Are Blue. For those of you who know colors, red and blue make purple, which is another word for violet. SO, to connect the dots, each of these fics will be based off of a Hey Violet song. If you will check the title, you'll see this one was based on the song "Hoodie" by Hey Violet. (These fics are not necessarily related to one another-- if there is a prerequisite fic in the series, I will make note so everyone is on the same page... literally.)
Relationships: Sarutobi Asuma/Yuuhi Kurenai
Series: Shinobi Blood Is Red, Shinobi Tears Are Blue [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1543393
Kudos: 13





	Hoodie

** _“You’d probably think I was psychotic, if you knew_ **

** _What I still got in my closet, sad but true._ **

** _Slip it on over my shoulders,_ **

** _Something I’ll never get over,_ **

** _It makes me feel a little bit closer to you.”_ **

  
  


It was a long walk from where Kurenai lived to the memorial stone. Balled tightly in her hand was an old hoodie— one of her most prized possessions. She could have flickered to the stone, been there in an instant, but something about the walk was also part of the catharsis of the visit. It was her time to mentally prepare for the tears she would cry, for the sensation of the deep-seated ache in her chest blossoming into fresh, bloody agony. Well, she would  _ try  _ to prepare for it— she wasn’t sure that anyone could. Maybe Hatake could… after all, he was pretty good at doing the impossible, and he had several years of experience on her in the mourning department. 

The day was bright and sunny, but had no right to be so while the storm in Kurenai’s heart raged on. It was no wonder that she found the memorial standing solitary, without a single visitor— today was not a day for mourning. It was one for laughing, for playing, for  _ living _ . The dead had no place on a day such as this. Perhaps that’s what pained Kurenai the most— Asuma should be taking the old Team Ten out for barbeque, or losing to Shikamaru at Shogi, not rotting in the grave. With that thought came a certain sickness in Kurenai’s stomach that would have brought her to her knees, had she not already knelt in front of the stone to talk to her lost love. 

“Asuma,” she murmured, touching the engraving of his name.  _ Sarutobi Asuma— KIA _ . Her emotions almost overwhelmed her, but she fought against the burning in her nostrils and the stinging of her eyes. She couldn’t cry now— she had too much to say.

“If you were here, you’d probably call me crazy,” she smiled wryly, imagining the teasing smile he would give her. “But I’m still rocking your hoodie. Do you remember when you gave it to me? I do. It’s one of my favorite memories.”

It was indeed one of her favorites. Kurenai remembered it like it was yesterday. They were only teenagers, and it had been winter in Konoha.

_ “Holy shit, it’s so cold,” Asuma griped, walking alongside her. “How are you not freezing your ass off in that dress?” _

_ Kurenai grinned. “I am, but a shinobi should never reveal their discomfort, especially not a kunoichi. You’re just being a big baby.” _

_ As if to verify whether or not she was lying, Asuma touched her arm and instantly recoiled. “Damn, you _ are _ cold. Here, you need this more than I do.” He slipped off his hoodie and draped it over her shoulders. She would have protested— she didn’t need any man’s help— but the hoodie  _ was  _ very warm, and it smelled nice… not unlike barbecue, but still nice.  _

_ “Thank you, ‘suma-kun,” she murmured, shooting him a grateful smile even as he crossed his arms to fend off the cold. “So chivalrous of you.” _

Even years later, he’d blamed his blush on the cold, and Kurenai felt herself smile a little remembering it. 

“I may not can keep your love, your kiss, or anything else,” she continued, thumbing one of the seams in the hoodie. “But I have this. It makes me think about you so I wear it when I sleep. The smell of your cologne is still on it, and it makes me feel just a little bit closer to you.”

The stone had no answer— why should it? Kurenai shook her head, but couldn’t stop herself from giving a pause in the place of a response.

“I haven’t changed anything about it— I’ve kept the broken zipper, the cigarette burns, all of it. They’re memories to me, Asuma. I hope you don’t mind, but I still chew on the strings the way you used to fuss at me about.” 

She tried to speak more, but found her voice choked by tears that she hadn’t even realized she’d been crying. She remembered how they’d broken the zipper— Asuma’s impatience to get her out of it during one of their forays— and the cigarette burns had probably been there since Asuma had started smoking. Just looking at it brought back a thousand and one different memories, but soon Kurenai’s vision was blurred by her tears, and sobs wracked her body. 

_ I miss you,  _ she wanted to say, but her mouth wouldn’t move. 

“If-if you want it back,” she managed to choke out, gripping the hoodie so hard that it was a wonder she hadn’t ripped a hole in it. “Come ta-take it back.”

She imagined that Asuma was watching on with a smile, maybe kissing her forehead gently. It didn’t stop the tears, but instead made them worse. 

_ Come back,  _ she wanted to beg, wanted to scream.  _ I gave you everything and all I got was this hoodie. _

She was startled to feel a hand on her shoulder, and she blinked back her tears to see an eye-smiling Hatake Kakashi next to her. 

“He loved you very much,” Kakashi told her, sitting down on the grass beside her. 

Kurenai said nothing, only sobbed harder when she noticed the smallest shine of tears building in Kakashi’s eyes. They sat like that for a while, each grieving in their own way, and Kurenai had never felt so grateful for unexpected company.

“How did you move on?” Kurenai asked through her labored breathing. 

Kakashi chuckled. “I haven’t.”

“Oh.”

For some reason, that was a small comfort. Something just kind of clicked into place, and she felt a little better. Maybe the goal wasn’t to move on— maybe it was to merge the past and the future, experiencing one without forgetting the other. It certainly seemed to make more sense that way.

“Thank you, Kakashi-san,” Kurenai told him once she had composed herself, placing a chaste kiss on the copy-nin’s masked cheek. 

“Asuma was a good man,” he replied, still smiling through those tears. “He wouldn’t want you to grieve.”

“I know,” Kurenai replied as she slipped on Asuma’s hoodie. 

With the hoodie still on, she walked back through the village, no longer so sad, but instead a little joyful, wrapped in the memories her lover’s hoodie held. Today, she could live, and remember. It’s what he would want. He always had a smile, her Asuma, with the signature Sarutobi mischief in his eyes— she should be the same. Kurenai knew she’d never be over him, but that didn’t have to be a bad thing. He’d given her his hoodie, after all. It was kind of like having him there with her. 

**Author's Note:**

> sorry :/


End file.
